Chess Openings: Learn to Play the Black Lion Defense!

Chess Openings: Learn to Play the Black Lion Defense!

There are many aggressive chess openings for black against e4, but there is a trending opening line for black with the Black Lion Defense. This looks to combine both ideas from the Philidor Defense and Pirc Defense, while adding it's own chess strategy, chess moves, and chess ideas. The Black Lion Defense is a very fun chess opening for black which has been pushed by @GingerGM and others. The Black Lion Defense has good chess opening strategy, chess opening lines, chess opening variations, chess opening ideas, chess opening moves, chess opening principles, chess opening tactics, chess opening tricks, and chess opening traps. The Black Lion Defense is not for the faint of heart, as we look to checkmate the opponent quickly out of the opening. The Black Lion Defense is a good chess opening for beginners, and a good chess opening for intermediate players. Why is this?

3 REASONS THE BLACK LION IS GOOD FOR CHESS BEGINNERS/INTERMEDIATE PLAYERS

1. The Black Lion Defense is easy to learn - it's idea is very straightforward and simple. It looks to ideas from the Philidor Defense and Pirc Defense - while adding it's own flavor too. We begin by simply developing our pieces, with a then straightforward plan of h6/g5/and soon Nf4. We can also activate our rook on the g-file, and then look to checkmate the opponents king as quickly as possible.

2. The Black Lion Defense is good! This is not one of those openings which relies on the opponent making a silly mistake, but has been used at the master/grandmaster level many times. This being said, it is a little bit single dimensional - meaning that white can stop it. However, if they do, we will still have a very playable game and we will show that in this video.

3. The Black Lion Defense is fun! If you are an aggressive and attacking chess player, this opening might just be for you. It starts slow, but you will find yourself with a ton of fun and attacking games, especially if your opponent is not well prepared for the chess opening theory.

We finish out this video by covering a game played by FM Zoran Todic, as he brilliantly used the Black Lion Defense to get a nice win. On this YouTube chess channel, we don't want to just cover lines and variations which you have to memorize. We also want to cover core strategies and themes, giving you flexibility in how you want to approach your games. We also want to give you the chess opening tools to beat higher rated players and improve at chess fast. Again, if you are an aggressive chess player and want to reach fun middlegame positions, the Black Lion Defense is a top tier chess opening for black against e4! We hope you enjoy learning how to play the Black Lion Defense!

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[HongwareeChannel]

Dude, people really doesn't deserve your videos about openings. I've seen a lot of instructionals, and the way you explain it, with the right pace and your minimalistic yet not vulgar presentation makes everything so enjoyable and you are THE BEST. You are the best school I could ever recommend to anyone starting in chess or trying to learn new things. I just love your openings videos. You deserve 1, 000, 000 views and subscribers, you really do. Thanks for the effort and for making chess more aprochable to all of us. Love, ton of love for ya, me mate.

[alancoe]

I play this often, but you're really helping with that Bxf7+ variation. Psychology is important when playing humans, and if you can weather that variation, it would freak those in crush mode when you don't curl up and croak out.
It is a fairly simple system, but that's why I still use it, especially if I've been away from chess for a bit, and just want to get a decent middlegame. Thank you, Solomon.

[chrisdubay]

You really need to publish your own course. Your one of the top 5 instructors out there! Good luck and ty for your work.

[Delta--tetrahydrocannabinol]

Eyy, finally found the time to leave a fat comment.
Love the video. For the limited amount of resources you've had at the time of recording, you did great job of covering the most critical lines and scratching the surface of the main plans.

I personally strongly disagree with your statement, that the black lion is single dimensional. I've been playing it for almost two years now and I still find a TON of room for experiments. This nbd7, nf8, ng6, nf4 is the main plan, but it's far from your only option and having only this on trick to work with, will almost certainly loose you some rating points. The lion in my opinion is just as flexible (if not more!) as any system type of opening such as london or king's indian.
I kind of think that the middlegame positions you've shown aren't very illustrative especially for new players, who will base their plans and goals, but again, with limited resources (it's hard to look for lion games cuz they are often called different names and this annoys philidor players too) it's hard to actually find an illustrative middlegame in such a flexible and somewhat reactive system.

As for some practical tips I'd like players to have: here is my experience or rather habits I've developed while playing almost exclusively lion for the past year (with short breaks, after getting tilted I took some time to calm myself down with gambits). This is correct more times than not (not always tho), but great to watch out for :
- a5 is an amazing defensive resource since you want to stop b4, b5 from white breaking your pawn chain. If your opponent prepares b4 with a3, just push a4 and take *an crossaint*. Play this early if enemy's c pawn isn't blocked by the knight.
- you will sometimes need to use your queenside rook as a defensive resource to gain yourself some tempi. I sometimes go as far as sacrificing it entirely (it's not gonna participate in my kingside assault, so it's disposable) to set whte 3 moves behind on the attack. Stockfish doesn't like me, but I don't like if either. Smd stockfish, I won that game.
- if your opponent commits a lot of resources to defending the king, you can use your queenside rook to create some threats there instead and try to dislodge enemy pieces away from the defence.
- g3 is not scary. ALWAYS sack the knight to the g pawn to take back with your own g pawn with check from the rook. If it's not check, then what are you doing? Always realize where to aim your guns before pulling the trigger. This takes some time to get used to, but you'll get the hang of it.
- if your opponent blunders anything to the pin on the g file, the game is almost over, just look for what looks cool. I've had positions where I had 2 bishops for 2 rooks and stockfish said -5 despite me being down material so much.
- in some positions you'll need to use your f pawn to prevent white's rook from coming to the 3rd rank. this is rare and occurs when you are forced to push your g pawn up ur opponent's face, but it does happen and it is important.
- you cannot worry about being down material. Just realize your attack is strong.
- your pawn structure will be worse in the endgame 9/10 times. Don't worry about that. The lion's pawn structure is suited to take way important squares from your opponent and most of the time immediate siplification is borderline impossible if you restrict enemy movements the right way. This will take practice, but you'll get the hang of it.
- unlike Solomon, I am completely unafraid of this nh4, nf5 manouver. I make sure that I can safely get my knight to f4 and just take on f5 with the bishop. White's pawn on f5 will not be dangerous, because you haven't castled and it's undefended. This is not the case if you get your pawn to f4, where it will be the former g pawn defended by the e pawn eying nasty stuff against white's castled king. JUST KEEP THIS IN MIND IT'S *SUPER IMPORTANT*: if there is still tension in the center and you see enemy's knight come to f5 DO NOT PLAY NF8!!! Dxe5 dxe5 n g7 IS MATE!!!
- you need different strategies for when the enemy fiancettos. If he fiancettos on the kingside, you'll need to leave your rook on h8 and preassure the h file instead of the g file. If he fiancettos on the queenside, pay close attention to how many times your e pawn is defended.

I have more tips, but I completely ran outta time while writing this comment. I'll try to update it some time in the future.
I've be recently gradually ditching my other openings to become somewhat of a lion specialist and I'm having a lot of success as well as fun pursuing that goal.
This opening is not as easy as it looks and actually has a lot of theory behind it, so get ready to loose some rating points while you are training. I've easily lost like 200 rating just with this opening before it singlehandedly carried me to my peak. It requires a lot of feel for the position like in kia/kid so play it a lot, experiment and analyze.

[dennisharrell]

As always, you uncover some variations I've never seen before. This is why your videos figure prominently in my openings library.

[geethuvarghese]

Wow! U covered it! Thx! ❤ Nh4 was my biggest concern..

[s.m.j.tayebi]

Thank you Solomon! Always Interesting Clips!

[mahaswingiri]

Superb video man i love your explanation very nice ideas...i am going to change my opening to black lion now...
keep it up!!!

[PriveGitaarles]

Thanks for this video Solomon, great fireworks!

[REKKnives]

I've been playing a variation of this over the past few days after GM Igor smirnov posted it the other day... Love the lines you cover here though! Thanks Solomon 👊🤙

[danno]

You explained that really really well! Thanks - much appreciated…

[Alexacavatina]

Very nice ideas ....your Channel is one of the best on you tube

[robertgonsalves]

Wonderful explanation of yet another opening. Thanks..

[suspiciousnerdwithligma]

Pretty great opening. Excited for the S2 of subscriber game analysis. I mean, how the most solid positions become the fiercest attacks just blows my mind.

[allencallahan]

Superb analysis. Kudos, and many thanks!

[CalebJNelson]

I used to be in a now disbanded infantry battalion called the Black Lions. So this is rather interesting.

[briandwi]

Just come across your channel. This is a really detailed and helpful video. Time to hit the subscribe button!

[robertplant]

Looks like a Philidor line. Good defense.

[jonshive]

Been in similar positions as Black after White's Bxf7+ and then Nxc7 but simply resigned without playing it out. Thanks for giving yet another example of how in chess, as in life, appearances can be deceptive and why continuing the fight is usually the best policy.

[hazhirhiwa]

Very aggressive lines, thanks a great master ❤️